Koulibaly hails Al Hilal mentality as Inzaghi's men move one point off top | OneFootball

Kalidou Koulibaly praised Al Hilal’s resilience after they came from both a goal and a man down to defeat Al Fateh at the death and move to within one point off Roshn Saudi League leaders Al Nassr.

The 2023-24 champions conceded within nine minutes of the Matchweek 9 encounter at Kingdom Arena on Saturday night, Mourad Batna casually converting a penalty having been felled in the area by Ruben Neves.

However, Darwin Nunez restored parity midway through the first half to mark his return following injury. The Uruguayan, a high-profile summer signing from English Premier League side Liverpool, latched onto a superb through-ball from Koulibaly to round goalkeeper Fernando Pacheco and finish into the net.

It marked Nunez’s fourth goal in six RSL appearances.

Al Hilal then had to overcome a straight red card for Nassr Al Dawsari on 79 minutes, but they did so expertly when, with two minutes of normal time remaining, Neves atoned for his earlier infringement by coolly slotting home from the penalty spot.

Al Fateh’s Sattam Tambakti had been deemed to have handled inside the visitors’ area.

The last-gasp victory means Al Hilal stay unbeaten in the RSL this season, stretching their win streak in all competitions to 11.

“[Our mentality] is really important in that every game cannot be perfect,” Koulibaly said post-game having been named Man of the Match. “We had a lot of difficulties today because Al Fateh is a great team, but we showed a lot of character.

“Even when 10 players, we wanted to win the game and thanks God, we won it. We can be happy tonight because it was a tough game, against a nice team and we keep on working to be better and better.”

On the resilience shown to come back, especially following Nasser’s sending off, the Senegal international said: “Yes, it's true. It's difficult with 10 players to have this big energy to go and come back in the game and to win this game, was really, really good for the confidence of the team.

Ruben Neves stood strong from the spot two minutes from time to seal Al Hilal's win

“Every team when they play against Al Hilal, they want to show their best and they had a great game today. The two last games were difficult [in Matchweek 8, Al Hilal won 4-2 at Al Najmah], but the most important is to get the three points.

“We get it, thanks God, but we’re going to keep on working because we know that nothing is perfect. But we're going to do everything to make the Al Hilal fans happy, to win every game. We know that is difficult, but thanks God today we won.”

Al Hilal will hope that Al Khaleej can do them a favour on Sunday, when the table’s sixth-side travel to leaders Al Nassr. It won’t be easy, though, since Cristiano Ronaldo and Co boast a 100 percent record in the RSL this season, with eight wins from eight.

Of course, Al Nassr are now managed by Jorge Jesus, Al Hilal’s title-winning head coach who enjoyed huge success in the blue half of Riyadh before being appointed this summer at their capital arch-rivals.

Asked on Saturday about the difference between playing under Jesus and current manager Inzaghi, Koulibaly replied: “With Jesus it was good because we had two great years after he left us and today, we have a new coach. We played the [FIFA Club] World Cup with him with new ideas.

“We are playing with lot of experience; we are playing a lot with the head more. And today we can see the result on the pitch.

“Even if we are not good on the pitch, we can show that we can win the game, and this is important. You have to win when you play good and you have to win also when you don't play good. And today we can be happy.”